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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadCambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges - Luke 6:3 - 6:3
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3. οὐδὲ τοῦτο ἀνέγνωτε; ‘Have ye not even read this?’ He answers them in one of their own formulae, but with a touch of irony at their ignorance, which we trace also in the “Did ye never read?” of St Mark;—never though ye are Scribes and devote all your time to the Scriptures? Perhaps the reproving question may have derived an additional sting from the fact that the very passage which our Lord quoted (1Sa 21:1-6) had been read on that Sabbath as the Haphtarah of the day. The service for the day must have been over, because no meal was eaten till then. This fact does not however help us to determine which was the second-first Sabbath, because the present Jewish lectionary is of later date.
καὶ οἱ μετ' αὐτοῦ ὄντες. That the day on which this occurred was a Sabbath results from the fact that it was only on the Sabbath that the new shewbread was placed on the table, Lev 24:8-9. Christ might simply have answered the Pharisees by laying down the principle that moral necessities abrogate ceremonial obligation. But the concrete instance from their own Scriptures was more convincing. The divine readiness and absolute cogency of our Lord’s replies at once mark His Messianic dignity.